Page 69 of The Prince and the Ice King

Like most days, Reardon didn’t so much as teeter backwards. “Then do it,” he said with a maddeningly stable expression. “But I’m not leaving.”

Jack had never known anyone so stubborn!

And he refused to listen to Josie’s voice in his head saying—he was.

“I am not your love,” Jack affirmed.

Only then did a flicker of heartache pass over Reardon’s face, but that too was replaced with a determined smile. “Then be my friend. We were friendly before last night, weren’t we? We were starting to know one another—truly, not only… carnally. So let us start again from there.

“Either way, Majesty, I believe this curse can be broken, but my kingdom must see reason too, or head down its own doomed path. Would you deny me that chance?”

That was unfair, like a lowly highwayman using Jack’s own past against him.

Reardon kept his smile and gestured to the window—which was when Jack realized his other hand held a book. “It’s a lovely morning. I thought we’d read up on the ramparts to start today’s audience. Unless you’re still feeling an urge to throw me from them?”

Jack could ignore him, turn from the prince in silence and disappear into the tunnels alone, but Reardon knew the tunnels now too and was not likely to be easily dismissed.

Rocking back on his icy haunches, Jack huffed with a visible snort. “I might toss you to your demise yet, sodo nottest me,” he warned but motioned for Reardon to lead the way.

Pillars of Virtuewas not a love story but, to Jack, it played out as one. The knights, Sir Waite and Sir Kent, were stationed to guard a watchtower together, and initially seemed to clash. Waite was stoic and calculating, while Kent was heartfelt and impulsive. They countered one another in every way, but because of that, they also balanced each other, and through their differences found things to admire in one another.

Their kingdom was constantly threatened by invading forces, and they were soon considered the lucky sentinels who, when on watch, always managed to ward off attacks or stop them before they became more than the kingdom could handle.

If it hadn’t been for the side stories of Kent falling for a sassy barmaid and Waite’s cat-and-mouse with a female rogue, the ending could have easily culminated in a passionate kiss.

Jack and Reardon didn’t quite get that far into the story, with Reardon reading aloud, his voice as lovely as if he were singing another bard’s tale. Instead they reached the point when the knights were first starting to display fondness for one another. Jack had been listening less closely, remembering where the story led and looking out at the distant horizon beyond his kingdom, when he realized Reardon had stopped speaking.

He turned to see Reardon watching him, the book carefully marked with a ribbon to find their place later.

“Even this fictional kingdom with its stalwart knights doesn’t seem perfect,” Reardon said. “There’s crime, corruption, unrest inside the walls and out. Tell me, Majesty, if you could do it all again, what would you have done differently?”

“You mean, besides everything?” Jack droned.

“I’m serious.” That earnest patience was very difficult to turn away from, so Jack didn’t try.

“I… wouldn’t have dismissed all the advisors. A few, certainly, but not the kind and competent ones. I would have stopped my philandering—well, lessened it—to focus on state matters. I would have listened to the people, not to give in to their every whim, but to deliberate and understand what I could truly provide that would be beneficial for all.

“The way things work here now, everyone gets a voice, but there must still be consensus or there would be chaos.”

“Sounds like the castle is the perfect version of a kingdom.”

“As is my penance.”

Pity filled Reardon’s face, and he gave a gentle sigh, but whatever Jack expected him to say, it wasn’t quite what he did. “Why not, instead… a legacy?”

Jack already had one—the dreaded Ice King, whispered about fearfully across the lands as a monster in a frozen castle. That was his legacy. Why did Reardon insist that it could be otherwise?

The young prince shivered, and Jack noticed how high the sun had trekked.

“Forgive me, Majesty, I’m growing cold.” Reardon stood from where he sat on the edge of the ramparts, gathering the book beneath hisarm. “I suppose our time is up for today. I had plans to visit the alchemist tower before lunch. Shall I see you tonight?”

“I told you—”

“I’ll keep my eyes closed. At least until you change your mind.” He bowed, and then turned to leave before Jack could protest further.

It was one of the few times when Reardon had offered to leave rather than Jack insisting at the first sign of his potion wearing off. That would have been infuriating enough, but worse was how, more than ever, Jack wasn’t ready to be without him.

He waited a reasonable amount of time before following Reardon, but when he did, he heard Zephyr’s voice.

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